Of Whispers and Smirks
by AceralRayneRaith
Summary: <html><head></head>She thinks it's really sad that, given the chance and the proper materials, she'd still draw his name, hers, and '4ever' in a heart on a notebook.</html>


So, here we are. Another Ouran fic. Though this one is far more angsty and much like my Guys and Dolls one. Please let me know what you think.

It's RengexKyoya, though there's some RengexTamaki explored, and one-sided TamakixHaruhi. And some oh-so-brief RengexHaruhi. I really tried to flesh Renge out more because I don't feel like people give her enough credit, and this is the result.

Reviews are love. Subsequently, I would appreciate if you shared some.

**Rating:** T. There are some mentions to adult situations, but it's never graphic. Deal.

**Disclaimer:** I own nothing of Bisco Hatori's. Though I would love Takashi. I do, however, own five new scars (three of which were given to me by my cat when I was trying to clean the corrosive she'd stepped in off her feet) and one pre-ordered copy of Jim Butcher's next book. Fuck yes!

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><p>Renge Hoshakuji is, by no means, a genius, but she is, generally, a smart girl.<p>

So, she really does get it when Kyoya says he doesn't love her. In a way (though it makes her chest hurt), it makes sense.

He really knows nothing about her. And she really only wishes she knew _some_thing about him.

When she was younger, she used to dream of princes, white horses, and dragons. And happy endings. There were always happy endings. And then, she found Uki Doki Memorial. And it changed everything.

You know, in a way, she really does hate that game. Maybe if it hadn't come into her life, she wouldn't be cursed by this wanting, dull, always-present ache that sits in the middle of her chest (slightly tilted to the left).

(She thinks that video games (even simulation games) are disgusting. She vaguely hates them all.)

But she's a hypocrite, and so she won't stop playing them either.

It's the one chance she'll ever get to be with her Prince.

* * *

><p>On sunny days when there is nothing to manage nor work to do, Renge sits outside on the balcony off her bedroom, fanning herself with an exquisitely antique fan.<p>

And she thinks of France.

She had many suitors in France—people liked her large eyes and larger bows, and it wasn't so bad to be a fangirl there… well, at least nobody said anything.

She thinks it sad—this little school girl crush she has on him—even though she's graduated both high school and college, can legally drink, and is a well-formed, well-bred young woman of society.

* * *

><p>She thinks it's really sad that, given the chance and the proper materials, she'd still draw his name, hers, and '4ever' in a heart on a notebook.<p>

* * *

><p>It's after their high school graduation, and Haruhi drags her off to the side after they've received their diplomas and the crowds are thinning for individual receptions and parties and well wishes.<p>

"I'm a girl," the brunette states without much preamble, and Renge just stares for a minute before she leans forward and presses her lips to the other girl's.

There's one quavering moment. A flash of something that's brief and warm and could be nice because it's smooth and soft and makes her toes tingle for a minute. Her fingertips itch at her side, and she can almost taste the surprise in the kiss. It makes her think of honey and sunshine, and she really enjoys it. But then, it feels wrong. Because it's too smooth and too surprised and too warm; it isn't a shadow kiss, and it isn't cold and calculating, and they aren't his lips against hers.

When she pulls back, Haruhi is staring at her, slack-jawed, and Renge fidgets lightly, hands flying to smooth the large bow that's holding back a ribbon of her hair.

"It never could have worked between us, love; you aren't my type," she sighs softly, reaching out to tangle her fingers through the hand the small, studious brunette has swinging at her side. "I'm practically committed anyway."

She leans forward, a devilish spark in her eyes, and watches as the other girl swallows nervously and leans back.

"I'm sure we can still be friends," Haruhi offers, her jaw finally relocating and her vocal bands finally pressing air into sounds.

"We already are," Renge admonishes, and the other girl nods her head and ducks her chin and relents.

Renge is impossible to dissuade, and she's always thought that that was an admirable quality. Only, looking at this girl before her and thinking over Kyoya and how he _pretty much_ hates her, she thinks that maybe, just maybe, she should cool it a bit. While she's always known what she wanted and how it get it, it seems that it's not what people like in a person.

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><p>She hates that she's <em>the<em> person that embodies everything people don't like in others.

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><p>Her best friend is one Tamaki Suoh. They discover one another when they're out of high school and attending college together because she curses in French in one of their shared classes and he laughs. It just begins then, and she doesn't know why she's never liked him before.<p>

They have so many shared interests that they're practically the same person, after all.

They get together, speak French, laugh, talk about Kyoya, and then try to forget about their conversations of Kyoya because it hurts.

It's Kyoya that really bonds them. That makes her realize that maybe there could be another way to live besides being hung up on a boy who will never love her.

* * *

><p>So, she kisses Tamaki and tells Haruhi and thinks that maybe she can live like this. Her explanation to the other female is that, really, Tamaki's already pretty much a whore, and she can't be just waiting for something and doing nothing.<p>

(She believes that it's nice enough to get the next best thing, though: if she can't have him, at least she can have his best friend.)

The brunette looks at her with hugely dark, studious eyes, but Renge starts burbling to distract her friend, and anything that might have been said to contradict these words disappears with a sigh.

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><p>One night, it turns into too much with Tamaki (because they're in her father's study, and there's cognac and bourbon, and she starts drunkenly ranting about Kyoya (and why can he not love her? She really does want to know)). Tamaki shuts her up by kissing her because that's what she told him to do, and it's very heady all of a sudden because his breath smells sweet, and she thinks that maybe this slim chest beneath her hand could belong to another, as could the silky strands of hair entwined around her fingers.<p>

It's really quite easy to forget. Neither one wants to hurt one boy because he comes from a world of hurt and that isn't for what they're there. They don't even have to agree to keep it quiet; that just, sort of, happens too.

(Still: his cheeks will forever color whenever he sees her, and she will forever be unable to meet his eye.)

* * *

><p>Eventually, everyone will figure it out. Secrets are never very secret in the Host Club.<p>

* * *

><p>It's very surprising when Kyoya starts talking to her because he's always, generally, ignored her existence. But she preens beneath his attentions, thinking that maybe, just maybe, he's realized that he's loved her all along.<p>

* * *

><p>The first time he asks her to marry him it's to appease his father, she knows it. He does things too romantically, and he is all smiles that night before he sweeps down into a dramatic genuflection to ask for her hand in marriage.<p>

It's everything that she's ever wanted from him.

So, she says 'No'.

(As much as it hurts her heart to say it.)

For one minute, he looks absolutely stunned. And then angry. And then cold.

He starts off too politely then: "May I ask whyever not?"

And, all she can do is smile as she walks away from this picnic he's set up, calling over her shoulder, "You're very smart. I'm sure you'll figure it out."

Her eyes burn all the way back home, but she only lets herself shed two tears.

(What can she say? She's a bit of a masochist after a fashion.)

* * *

><p>The saddest part to her is that they weren't even properly dating before he went to all of those lengths. She thinks that she would have taken him proposing over pizza and beer, just as long as they'd been in a real relationship.<p>

* * *

><p>Eventually, he asks her again. And she consents. He looks so pleased with himself that she waits a week before she cancels on him.<p>

Renge's not a tease. Really. She just thinks that, maybe, even she deserves some happiness in her love life and marital status.

* * *

><p>She later finds out that his father was not pleased to hear about her refusal and slapped his son. She feels so guilty and wanton and all sorts of other things that she has her maid tie her to her chair to prevent her from running to his side, begging for forgiveness.<p>

She's pretty sure that it's terrifyingly sad that the woman doesn't even blink an eye at the request.

There are times when she really does hate herself.

* * *

><p>The next time he asks her, he demands it. There is none of Tamaki's charm, Hunny's cuteness, Mori's shyness, or the twins' incest; he strides up to her, snapping his notebook closed, glasses flashing, and says, "It would be most profitable for us to wed. As such, I'm sure we can come to a business arrangement that would satisfy your needs and my wants. You just need name the day, and everything shall be all settled."<p>

She laughs at him and flounces away.

(Really, she wants to break down sobbing about how she's been reduced to a common commodity in his eyes. Renge may not be the brightest girl, or the prettiest, or the calmest, but she's always thought she's worth more than an AfBA.)

* * *

><p>He does learn, eventually, after he realizes that she isn't just going to give in willingly.<p>

The first date is awkward.

There's a posh, rented-out restaurant, and flowers, and delicious food. It _should_ be perfect. Except they don't talk and he gets a call during dinner (concerning work—he's making power plays on his father's company and is gradually taking over) and _has_ to take it. So, she sits there and imagines they're talking and laughing.

At the end of the night, she almost wants to thank him.

The fantasy, as it so often is, was even better than reality.

If there's one thing to be said about Kyoya it's that he doesn't give up. Not two days after the disastrous date, he telephones to ask her out again.

The spark of girlish hope that she's always beaten down rises unbidden.

* * *

><p>She's twenty-two years old, has just finished college, and her father comes in one day to sit on her bed.<p>

"Marry the boy, pet."

She startles because her father has never _made _her do anything, but she still knows what a command sounds like.

It makes her cheek flush hurriedly and her nose rise defiantly; she's never realized how _angry_ a command would make her, and she has to wonder how the staff has put up with her for all of these years.

"_What_ do you mean?" she hisses, and her father twists his face into this contrite expression as he pats her knee.

"Renge, love, ma biche, please. He's asked you to be his wife so many times, and you've rejected him after every occurrence. I do believe that you've made your point—he understands, and this lesson after the whole high school thing has been cleared up by his actions. Just accept the offer."

She rises abruptly, color blooming in the pale eves below her cheekbones as her eyes flash irritably.

"You'll have no say in this matter when you know so little."

She storms out, catching the sigh her father gives (even though she wasn't supposed to hear it) and her chest aches more.

* * *

><p>That night, she goes home and tries to pretend she's not putting the game into its player. That she isn't turning on the screen. That she isn't playing it again.<p>

But it doesn't help.

She suddenly hates the boy there with his charming personality, ready smile, and honeyed promises of love. She prefers him dark and distant and cool with no idea of how to please her when all she wants is to feel loved.

She can't understand why it is that nobody will love her.

* * *

><p>It's one day after she's come to this decision, and she and Tamaki are in his room, not talking and not looking and not touching by the instrument Tamaki loves so dearly.<p>

She sits on the lacquered piano bench and tries not to sniffle. Tamaki is by her side, eyes wide, though unseeing, as his fingers glide, though do not press, across the keys.

"So, you're going to marry him?"

She whimpers, head ducked, feet crossed demurely at the ankles, hands twined in her lap.

"I think we've always known I would," she states after a moment. He pretends he doesn't hear how thick her voice is, and she pretends that she doesn't know that he notices.

He shakes his head, the scent of roses falling around them, and she looks around at the room that is blanketed in the roses his admirers give him and those that he gives himself when he's feeling homesick.

"I think I love you," he admits, and she sighs because she knows it's a lie. It's just what he, the ever-pleasing womanizer, feels is right in the situation.

"I don't love you. And you could never love me like Haruhi."

He laughs, a ping rising from the strings and ivory and beauty as his fingers stumble into a dissonance.

"I figured as much. But it's not like he cares."

"Probably not," she readily agrees, and it kills her to force the words out, but she does anyway, "but we both love him."

There's a pause where they both shift, pressing their shoulders together in a showing of silent solidarity, followed by them pressing their hips together, followed by them pressing their cheeks together.

It's an awkward position (he's taller than she is, and she's bonier than he is) that they only manage to hold for a second before she breaks the contact between their cheeks and their shoulders and their hips, turning to press her knee to his instead.

"You know, Haruhi will never love you. She likes Mori."

His fists clench on his thighs, and his lips thin, and a part of her smiles because she's made someone feel as awful as she does. And since Tamaki is her best friend, she figures he is the best one to have join in on her misery.

"Yes, well, I hope that you're prepared for a life where your husband cheats on you with his own laptop," he spits back, and she flinches.

"I've accepted my fate. I think it's about time that you did too," is all that she can murmur back in reply as she gets up to leave. He doesn't stop her, and she thinks that it's sad how they've come to an impasse over the fact that the two romantics they are do not have the romantic endings.

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><p>It's a Wednesday when Kyoya proposes for the last time, <em>exactly<em> two weeks after her discussion with Tamaki. Since then, the pair has gone out eight more times and has never had a legitimate conversation. She's no closer to knowing _anything_ about him than she was when she first moved from France.

He does not fidget, and he does not look ill. It is very detached, but she's learned to view their interactions from the outside, as if she's watching her own life happen around her when she's with him.

"I can't say that I love you," he prefaces, and with the distance she's put between her body and her mind, it doesn't hurt so badly to hear him say it.

"I can't say that I _don't_ love you," she parrots. "Not that you don't know it. I've loved you since before I even met you."

It's not really the truth, just what he expects her to say.

All Renge wants is to be loved, really and truly, for all of her faults and her assets, for the first time, but since she's never felt that, then she doesn't even know if she _can_ love another person.

"But I promise to care for you," he continues after a brief pause. "I will always do as such, but that is all that I can offer. You will be well-taken-care-of, and you will be happy, and you will never have to worry about finances, jobs, or anything that causes premature stress lines."

"If you would just get down on one knee," she pleads quietly. "I won't refuse you again. I grow weary of trying to teach you a lesson you'll never learn."

He chuckles across from her, picks up her hand from the expensive, watered silk tablecloth in this beautiful restaurant. Cherubic faces painted on the walls beam down on them as he slips this huge ring over her knuckles to the base of the ring finger on her left hand.

"I knew you would see reason," he continues smoothly, and she does not tell him that he never asked, nor did he ever get on one knee, nor did he propose like she'd always dreamed. "Let's have a smile now."

She frowns instead.

"There's my girl."

* * *

><p>Renge does not even plan her own wedding. His sister does, even tries to include her, asking questions and staring and smiling too frequently. Renge just sits there and shrugs and makes noncommittal sounds.<p>

She's the unhappiest bride that has ever been, she believes.

* * *

><p>At night, she doesn't go home because she can't stand her parents anymore (she wants to blame them for this mess because it makes it easier, rather than swallow the fact that she's the one who gave up). She goes to Tamaki's house and sleeps in his bed, and, sometimes, she wakes up, and he's staring at her.<p>

"Is it killing you? You look so unhappy, so how can you live like this?" he asks her whenever she catches him staring.

"Can you live with the fact that you'll never have Haru?" she probes back, and his face bleeds pale as he rolls away from her to the other side of the bed, his back to her.

She rolls over too, to her own side of the bed, and doesn't try to comfort him.

She hates that, by learning to view her and Kyoya's relationship from the outside, she views all of her other relationships from the outside as well. She can hurt people so much more easily when it isn't personal.

* * *

><p>Eventually, Tamaki stops watching her sleep and kissing her when she looks especially blue, meeting this lovely American girl instead. Tamaki gains that telling sparkle in his eyes again, and Renge gains more loneliness in her life.<p>

* * *

><p>Haruhi, who's never been quite the same since her mother's death, is utterly incapable of offering any words of comfort. Though she does let Renge crawl in beside her (and share a blanket) when a thunderstorm rolls around.<p>

* * *

><p>Eventually, her wedding day rolls around. It's beautiful, and she looks radiant, and she has a smile painted on for the entire evening as Kyoya accepts the congratulations on his new bride.<p>

They're barely on their honeymoon when he gets more "important calls and e-mails that have to be replied to immediately".

She looks at him with these huge eyes and says, "Just for this night. Just hold me for tonight, and I'll never bother you again."

Surprisingly, he consents, and she's able to buy into her fantasy (the one that's practically gone anyway) once more.

* * *

><p>It's not that Kyoya changes. And, really, she goes back to her fantasy world after that, so it's not like she changes either.<p>

It's just one morning, she wakes up in bed next to him and murmurs, "I really do think I love you."

And, she actually means it.

He doesn't say anything back, just rolls towards her and says something about more sleep, but when she's cleaning up his desk later that day (while he paces about on his phone, cunning some German businessman out of his company) she finds a thin, black notebook that looks rather weathered with age.

From Ouran, she realizes with a start.

The binding falls open beneath her touch, and there, in the corner, lies a small, neat heart, inside of which there are two sets of initials. The ink is rather faded looking, as if someone has run their fingertip over it too often, but there's a newer looking 'O' that's been added to the initials 'R. H.'.

She says nothing, but she gives birth to his son a year later.

And when he looks at her, he doesn't say 'I love you', but she can tell by his smirk that, maybe, _just maybe_, he really does.

* * *

><p>…So, I'm not sure that I really like the ending, but I'm trying to finish this and a paper I have due at four tomorrow. Yay procrastination?<p>

A vocabulary note: As Renge comes from France, I assume that she, and her family, speak French. As such, the name that her father calls her, 'ma biche', is a term of endearment. It literally translates out to 'my doe', but it's the equivalent of 'my sweetheart' or 'dear' in English.

I tried to keep the characters in character, but I felt that Renge needed some loving. I hope I did Hatori's work justice.

Reviews are lovely. Please leave them. Pretty please.


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